


Quietus

by Nemainofthewater



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Character Death, Death, Don't copy to another site, Fix-It, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Introspection, They all need hugs, all of them - Freeform, im so sorry, in that the apocalypse doesn't happen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-11
Updated: 2019-04-11
Packaged: 2020-01-11 08:04:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,918
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18426441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nemainofthewater/pseuds/Nemainofthewater
Summary: Quietus:/ˌkwīˈēdəs/LITERARYdeath or something that causes death, regarded as a release from life.ARCHAICsomething that has a calming or soothing effect.Klaus dies. And doesn't come back to life. This is the aftermath.





	Quietus

1.

 

Klaus opens his eyes. There’s a bell tolling somewhere in the distance. The sound of birds. Is he outside? In a forest?

 

He sits up slowly. He doesn’t remember how he got here, but that isn’t unusual. Being outside though… Klaus is a city boy through and through, has never ventured out far from New York. The countryside is too quiet, too full of ghosts screaming at him. To be fair the city is also full of screaming ghosts, it’s only that it’s much easier to find things to make them shut up for once.

 

So it’s disturbing that he managed to get so fucked up that he’s landed in the middle of nowhere.

 

Only… Is this nowhere? Because it looks eerily familiar. If Klaus squints, imagines the landscape covered in blood and death, with the sound of bullets flying through the air… It could be the jungles of Vietnam.

 

“Klaus. You finally made it.”

 

Klaus turns around so quickly he hears his neck crack, because that voice… That’s Dave. And there he is, standing in the weirdly faded sunlight. He’s dressed in civilian clothes but it’s him. Dave.

 

“How?” Klaus asks helplessly.

 

“Does it matter?” Dave asks, walking toward him. He crouches down beside Klaus who can’t help but raise a hand to touch the other man’s cheek. And he’s solid. He’s so gloriously solid, and Klaus can feel the heat of his body, can see the healthy blush of his skin.

 

“Dave,” he says, soft and reverent.

 

“Hey Klaus,” Dave says. He leans forward to hug Klaus who immediately latches on to him. Holding him. Like he’ll never let go.

 

“Welcome home.”

 

2.

 

Klaus isn’t meant to die. He isn’t. If there’s one thing that Ben has learnt in the years he’s been stalking his brother, it’s that Klaus has some freakish ability to bounce back from the jaws of death, probably high as fuck and laughing all the way.

 

There’s no way that he’s dead. Not like this. Not because Ben forced him to help Luther when Klaus very clearly didn’t want to.

 

Ben takes a deep breathe. And he _screams_.

 

3.

 

The phone rings. Diego looks down.

 

“Sorry,” he says to Allison, “I’d better take this.”

 

She nods at him, unable to conceal the flash of annoyance in her eyes.

 

“Hello?” says an unfamiliar female voice, “Is this Diego Hargreeves?”

 

“Speaking,” says Diego.

 

“I’m calling about your brother. Klaus,” says the voice.

 

Diego sighs.

 

“What’s he done now and how much’s the bail?” he asks. He rolls his eyes at Allison, who nods back at him and looks long-suffering. They know what Klaus is like.

 

There’s an awkward pause.

 

“Ah. I’m so sorry. But… We have a John Doe down at the morgue, and we have reason to think it might be your brother. We need you to come down and ID the body.”

 

“W-w-what?” Diego says stupidly. It’s not his fault that she’s stopped making sense.

 

(Part of him knows that’s wrong, that this moment has been coming since the moment Klaus broke his jaw and took heavy duty painkillers for the first time. He’ll never forget the fragile vulnerability in his voice, the fact that the first thing he said to Diego after he could speak again was ‘It made them stop’)

 

Allison leans forward anxiously. ‘What’s going on?’ she mouths. Diego waves her off distractedly.

 

“I’ll come down,” Diego says, “But you’ve got it w-wrong. It can’t be Klaus. No way.”

 

And he hangs up.

 

“What is it?” Allison asks again, properly.

 

And Diego…he doesn’t know what to say.

 

 

4.

Allison stifles a gasp.

 

Staring down at the body it’s definitely Klaus. Klaus, eyes glassy and vacant, face pale.

 

“No,” she says softly. Beside her, Diego looks as if he’s going to throw up.

 

“Do you know what happened?” she asks the morgue attendant, a young woman in inappropriately cheerful scrubs. She looks uncomfortable.

 

“We’re not really allowed to comment on-” she starts, and Allison. She snaps.

 

“I heard a Rumour,” she says, “That you told me everything you know about Klaus’ death.”

 

“He got into a fight,” the morgue attendant says mechanically, “Threw himself on top of this guy. It was an accident. His neck was broken. It was instantaneous.”

 

“Do you know why?” Diego asks.

 

The attendant hesitates.

 

“Answer him,” Allison says.

 

“He was calling for a ‘Luther’. Eyewitnesses say that this ‘Luther’ had had an altercation with our suspect, had choked him before offering him drugs.”

 

Something cold buries itself inside of Allison’s heart.

 

“No,” she says faintly, “He wouldn’t. Luther wouldn’t do that.”

 

There’s a dull curiosity in the attendant’s eyes. Behind her, Diego has broken out of his stupor, and is cursing, low and vicious.

 

“Do you know him?” the attendant asks dully.

 

“I thought I did.”

 

5.

 

“Luther! LUTHER! Where the fuck are you?”

 

Luther groans. His head hurts. He rolls over and freezes. Because there’s a girl in his bed. He glances down reflexively, and shudders when he sees his naked chest. After five years…he still hasn’t got used to it. The feeling of looking down and not knowing who the body belongs to. The feeling of wrongness and terror and pain and betrayal (only dad would never do anything like this without a good reason: he’d fucked up. He was too slow, not good enough. He’d forced dad’s hands. It had been the only way to save him.)

 

(Sometimes he thinks back to those empty days, the deserted house, the lonely missions. Patching himself up in the infirmary. Talking to an imaginary Allison because she’s the only one who would ever listen to him. And he just- he hates them. Hates all his siblings. Even Allison. Even Ben and Five. Because they left him. They left him)

 

“Urgh,” the girl groans next to him,” Who is that? And why are they yelling your name?”

 

“It’s my brother,” Luther says. “He’s an asshole.”

 

“Well,” says the girl (Jay? Jane? Jamie?), “Since we’re up anyway…” She leans in to kiss him, not even glancing at his chest. Luther relaxes and leans into the kiss.

 

BANG

 

A model plane falls off a shelf.

 

“What…?” Luther asks.

 

Two more come to life and launch themselves off the shelf toward Luther and Jay.

 

“No,” she says, “Fuck that. I don’t know what crazy prank you’re playing on me, but it’s not worth it.”

 

Luther watches in silence as she quickly pulls her clothes on and leaves. As soon as the door closes behind her, his room explodes into motion: his possessions are thrown every which way, a veritable hurricane of childhood mementos. Luther yells and practically falls out the bed scrambling out the door.

 

(He thinks…He imagines…He might have seen Ben in the middle of the storm. But that’s impossible. Because Ben is dead, he died years ago. And because Luther has never seen such a look of _hatred_ on his brother’s face).

 

“Luther!”

 

He turns around and there’s Allison. He blushes and tries to preserve his modesty.

 

Allison doesn’t notice. She doesn’t even glance down. Her face is… it’s devastated.

 

“Luther,” she says and her voice is emotionless, “We have to talk about what you did last night. And you’d better have a good explanation. Because I don’t think I stop Diego from killing you if you don’t.”

 

 

6.

 

Vanya is lost in the music. She’s trying to find _it_ again, the power that ran through her that afternoon in the forest. The emotions swirl through her, and she marvels at how vivid they are. How has she managed to survive so long without them?

 

The door clacks.

 

“Vanya?”

 

The music stops. Vanya lowers her bow.

 

“Allison?” she says, “What are you doing here?”

 

Allison crosses the room in quick strides and flings her arms around Vanya.

 

“Oh god,” she says, “I was so worried something had happened to you. Look, you need to come with me. Please.”

 

“Why?” Vanya asks, “If this is about Leonard again-”

 

“No. God no. It’s not. I mean, there’s something not right about him but- It can wait. Because Vanya. I need you to come home. Klaus-”

 

Allison gasps and Vanya can see the tears streaming down her face. She’s never seen Allison like this, never, not even when they were fourteen and dad had made her compel a criminal into walking off the roof. Allison has always been the strong one, the one who knows what she’s doing and how to get there. She’s never seen Allison like this before. Never. Her older sister is falling apart, and Vanya has no idea why.

 

“Hey,” Vanya says, dropping her violin and bow onto the couch and embracing Allison back, “Are you ok? What’s the matter? Is it Claire? Has something happened?”

 

Allison looks up at her, and Vanya can see the shadows under her eyes. The running mascara.

 

“It’s Klaus,” Allison says, half wondering like she’s still not sure whether what she’s saying is real or is part of some elaborate April Fool’s prank. Then she takes a dep breathe. Looks Vanya straight in the eyes.

 

“He’s dead.”

 

And suddenly Vanya wishes for her pills, fiercely. Wishes for the numbness they bring. The sense of detachment as if the world were blanketed in thick cotton wool.

 

Because. Klaus is dead. And she can feel _everything_.

 

7.

 

Five wakes up three days after his (latest) brush with death. And somehow…he knows. Maybe it’s his connection to the fabric of time. Maybe it’s a gut feeling. Maybe it’s just the Universe finally telling him something went right for once.

 

Whatever it is, Five knows deep in his bones that the Apocalypse is over. It’s been eight days since he arrived back from the future and the world is still standing in its shitty glory.

 

He must have done something that worked. Blowing up the Commission maybe or setting Hazel and Cha Cha against each other.

 

He painfully levers himself out of bed and makes his way to the room and down the stairs to where he can hear the sound of muted voices.

 

Allison, Luther, and Vanya are standing in a circle in the living room. Luther and Allison are standing close, emotions crackling between them. But…not like normal. No, Allison looks angry.  Vanya’s eyes are red and swollen. And Luther… Luther looks like a man whose foundations have been shattered, a man drowning.

 

“What’s going on?” Five asks and is disconcerted when they don’t react, “It’s over. The Apocalypse has been stopped.”

 

There’s a bitter bark of laughter to the side, and Five slowly turns. Diego is at the bar. He’s at the bar, and he’s savagely downing a shot. One of many, judging from the empty bottles around him.

 

“You and your Apocalypse,” he bites out. “Fuck your Apocalypse.”

 

And then, throwing one last angry look their way, he storms off.

 

“What’s the matter with him?” Five asks, laughing. Allison swallows heavily.

 

“Five,” she says slowly, “I think you’d better sit down.”

 

“What?” Five objects, “No. I need to go out. I need to figure out how I changed the timeline.”

 

Vanya makes a pained sound, and her eyes-they flash white. A concussive force bursts out from her, rattling glasses and flipping up carpets, making their portraits shudder. It dissipates before it can really reach Five, but he shivers nonetheless.

 

“What’s going on?” he asks.

 

“Sit down Five,” Allison repeats sharply. She stops. Opens her mouth.

 

“We need to talk,” she says, “About Klaus.”

**Author's Note:**

> I am on Tumblr as [Nemainofthewater ](https://nemainofthewater.tumblr.com)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Dead & Born & Grown](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18430673) by [siriuspiggyback](https://archiveofourown.org/users/siriuspiggyback/pseuds/siriuspiggyback)




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